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The Reuters news agency has discovered that the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration has been receiving “tips” from the NSA, a revelation that has conspiracy theorists and pragmatists alike shaking their heads. The most disturbing part of this disclosure is how the DEA’s use of “parallel construction” enables law enforcement to skirt pretrial discovery rules and…

A federal judge has overturned an Englewood, Colorado ordinance that seeks to limit where convicted sex offenders can live, calling it a conflict with “the state interest in the uniform treatment, management, rehabilitation, and reintegration of sex offenders during and after state supervision.” The ordinance barred convicted sex offenders from living within 2,000 feet of…

The Department of Justice has announced a new policy to handle low-level drug offenses committed by nonviolent offenders without gang affiliations. The policy is one part of a sweeping prison reform package introduced by Attorney General Eric Holder to an American Bar Association gathering in San Francisco on Monday. Holder unveiled the new policy, which…

In a unanimous decision, the United State Supreme Court has ruled that a judge’s participation in a plea negotiation does not constitute a reversible error, given the language in the Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 11(h), which stipulates that “a variance from this rule is harmless error if it does not affect substantial rights”. In…

The Supreme Court has issued a ruling on a defendant’s right to remain silent that directly impacts how prosecutors may use that silence as evidence in trial. In Salinas v. Texas, the court ruled that if an individual is voluntarily speaking to the police in a pre-arrest situation, and refuses to answer a specific question,…

The Supreme Court has overturned a Ninth Circuit Court ruling regarding the imposition of the Armed Criminal Career Act (“ACCA”) on a defendant with prior “violent felonies”. In its decision, the lower court had deemed it appropriate for the sentencing judge to go back to the guilty plea proceedings in a previous case; the Supreme…

In a 5-4 ruling, the U.S Supreme Court held that a defendant may not be sentenced under guidelines put in place after the crime was committed. In Peugh v. United States, the petitioner was convicted in federal court on five counts of bank fraud committed between 1999 and 2000, but was sentenced based on the…

In a potential blow to the Fourth Amendment right to privacy, and in what some are calling “a stunning victory for law enforcement”, the United States Supreme Court decided 5-4 to overturn a lower court decision in Maryland v. King, thereby allowing police to collect a DNA sample at the time of arrest. Proponents argue…

By David Lindsey Attorney of David Lindsey, Attorney at Law posted in Federal Sentencing Law on Tuesday, October 9, 2012. A hidden result of the inmate-phone industry is widespread discrimination in federal sentencing law, because the rates effectively disallow phone calls between inmates and their families who cannot afford the exorbitant price of a phone…

By David Lindsey Attorney of David Lindsey, Attorney at Law posted in Criminal Defense on Friday, October 5, 2012. A recently published study in the Journal of Neuroscience may affect the witness cross-examination by criminal defense teams at trial; it calls into question the validity of witness recall, citing research that demonstrates the way brain…